Leftover Halloween candy? You can eat it plain… or you can turn it into an outrageous soft and chewy Candy Cookie Cake filled with all your favorite chocolate! Perfect for Halloween, Valentine’s Day, wedding candy bars, birthday party pinatas, or any occasion that leaves you with an assortment of candy!
Okay, this title is a little bit of a misnomer. You don’t have to use leftover candy.
You could go to the store and buy all NEW candy just for this candy cookie cake. And if you don’t have any candy on hand, you totally should, because it is just that good.
Buuuuut it’s almost Halloween, so there’s a good chance you’re about to have some leftover candy on your hands — or the perfect excuse to go buy a big bag of assorted candy at half off!
Now, you could eat all that candy straight out of the bag. (And I support this, because I am pro-candy.)
Or you can bake with it. And given that this is a baking-based food blog, I’m pretty sure you can guess which option I’m going to suggest.
Have Snickers? Make these Snickers cheesecake bars.
Peanut Butter Cups? Allow me to suggest this peanut butter cup cheesecake dip. Or perhaps a chocolate peanut butter cup layer cake. Maybe this one bowl chocolate peanut butter cup bundt cake is more your style?
Too many M&Ms? I have you covered, with M&M pretzel kisses, soft and chewy M&M pudding cookies, or a no-bake M&M peanut butter pretzel pie.
Have a whole bunch of Kit Kats on hand? You need to make this Candy Cake – cover the top with whatever other candy you have on hand!
Or you can use all your assorted leftover candy and turn it into a delicious, both crispy and chewy, decadent, chocolate-filled candy cookie cake. Because, yes.
What’s better than a single cookie? A giant cookie turned into a cake! And especially a giant candy cookie cake.
It’s like all the best parts of a cookie, but even better. Because it’s one GIANT cookie cake, the outside can get nice and crispy and the inside can stay ooey-gooey and soft.
I like to load of up my cookie cake with brown sugar to keep it extra soft and moist – it almost feels undercooked in the middle (but fret not – perfectly cooked and safe to eat!).
Making a candy cookie cake is super quick and easy, too. It’s as simple as:
As far as what kind of candy to add to your leftover candy cookie cake? Whatever you like! I prefer the flavor of chocolate or peanut butter candies, but if you love gummies – go for it!
This version here has peanut M&Ms (my personal most favorite candy), Snickers, Butterfingers, Crunch, KatKats, 3 Musketeers, Milky Ways (my personal least favorite candy), Twix, Reeses Peanut Butter Cups, and a surrounding ring of Whoppers.
You could stick with all one kind of candy, but when it comes to candy, I feel like variety really is the spice of life.
And it’s not just because it looks nice to use a variety of candy, or because you’re getting different candy flavors. It affects the texture of the cookie cake, too! Why does this happen? It’s time for my favorite subject.. kitchen chemistry!
Kitchen Chemistry
Using a variety of candy in the cookie cake combines various sugars with different compositions and properties. Different candies contain different types of sugars, such as sucrose, fructose, glucose, and inverted sugars. Both the type of sugar and the amount of sugar in these different candies affect the final texture of the cookie cake. Candies with higher sugar content or made with inverted sugar melt more quickly, creating pockets of gooeyness within the cake, while lower-sugar candies tend to maintain their structure better, providing bursts of crunch or chewiness.
A giant soft and chewy cookie cake, filled with all your favorite candy.
Baked, fully cooled candy cookie cake can be wrapped in two layers of aluminum foil and stored in the freezer for up to 3 months. Thaw at room temperature overnight before slicing.
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